


oh my love, give me truth

by ohallows



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Family Fluff, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-07 22:46:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21225482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohallows/pseuds/ohallows
Summary: Azu loves the mountains; she’s been climbing them ever since she was a little girl, happily scraping up her hands and knees as she scrambles up the rock. The healer of their village would always scold her when she came back down, happily presenting her hands to him to be healed. It’s no different now; her hands are more calloused, more weathered from years of hard work, and she’s able to make the climb much easier than she was as a child.





	oh my love, give me truth

**Author's Note:**

> day 2: breeze/ripple/branches
> 
> write women in ur fics or die by my sword 2 electric boogaloo 
> 
> one of the best jokes made in this podcast was azu’s full name being azu t. paladin i don’t lie
> 
> me chanting: TRANS AZU TRANS AZU
> 
> good family feels with azu: because one member of this goddamn party deserves nothing but positive family relationships

The mountains of Kenya are gorgeous and tall, stretching high above the trees and the villages as they cast an imposing shadow on the ground below. They’re made of cracked rock and dust, slowly baking in the heat from the sun. 

Azu loves the mountains; she’s been climbing them ever since she was a little girl, happily scraping up her hands and knees as she scrambles up the rock. The healer of their village would always scold her when she came back down, happily presenting her hands to him to be healed. It’s no different now; her hands are more calloused, more weathered from years of hard work, and she’s able to make the climb much easier than she was as a child. 

Still, they grant her the same sense of serenity, the same sense of  _ centeredness _ as they always have. She likes to pretend that she’s able to see the whole world from here, and she’s right; she’s able to see her  _ own _ world, the village she grew up in, and that’s enough for her. 

She perches on the edge of the rock, sitting cross-legged as the sun begins to peek out from behind the mountains in the distance. The beams stretch across her skin, warming her and the rock below her, as she smiles, eyes slipping shut. 

It’s a perfect morning. She hums with the wind as it brushes against her face. Sometimes the wind whispers to Azu, soft voices on a breeze that smells of roses. She speaks back, always excited to hear from the gods, and then the wind dies down, leaving her alone and at peace.

“Up here again, are you?” she hears from a ledge below her, and glances over the edge to see Emeka standing there, looking up at her fondly. He doesn’t love the mountains as much as she does; he’d fallen from a ledge when he was young, and never quite gotten over it, but he braves the mountains for Azu when she’s up here. 

She reaches down to pull him up, grunting softly as she strains. He helps, using some natural footholds in the side of the cliff to push himself up, and then he’s resting on the rock next to her, decidedly not looking down. 

“Nice day,” he says, looking out over the landscape. “Bit hot.”

“It’s perfect,” she decides, and Emeka shrugs at her side, before laying back on the rock with his hands behind his head. It’s a comfortable silence, between the two of them. It always has been.

Azu loves her brother. She loves all her family, but her brother the most. He’d been the first one to support her when she confessed that she wanted to be his younger sister, not his younger brother. He’d supported her through all of it, through telling her parents, through choosing a name, through the spells that gave her the body she wanted instead of the one she had. Emeka had always been there for her, and she loves him all the more for it. 

“What’s on your mind,  _ dada mdogo _ ?” Emeka asks fondly, sitting up and rubbing at Azu’s bald head. 

“I’m going to be a paladin,” she says, turning and smiling up at Emeka, and he knocks his forehead into hers. “I’m going to be a paladin and help people.”

“Hmm,” Emeka says, “you’d be right good at that, you would.”

Azu beams up at him. “Do you really think so? Mama says so too.” 

“Well, Mama’s the smartest person I know, so if she thinks so, it must be true,” Emeka says, and Azu beams. 

She’s wanted to be a paladin for a while. The healer in her village had told her stories of being favored by the gods; he’d served as a cleric of Hestia for years, and even still draws his power from her love and his devotion. Azu wants that: wants to use her power and her dedication to heal people; to protect them. There’s a local church of Aphrodite in their village, and she’s always loved speaking with the paladins and clerics at festivals. 

Azu loves with her entire body; her mother and father have always said so, and before her grandparents passed they used to talk about how her smile could brighten a room, even on the most somber of occasions. 

“Do you think Baba will let me go?” she asks, face scrunched up. Her father is strict but caring, and Azu is worried she’ll disappoint him by not following his path into farming. He’s never said as much, but she knows he expects both of them to continue on in the family tradition, and even though Emeka still will, and she’s breaking it for a good cause, she never wants to be the reason for her father’s disappointment.

Emeka hums next to her, and tilts his head. “How much do you want to do this?” he asks, and Azu stops to think about it. She’s known that she’s  _ wanted  _ to do it for a while, but she’s never really thought about how  _ much _ she wanted to pursue it.

“With all my heart,” she says, eventually, and it’s the most confident she’s ever felt in the decision. Emeka gives her an approving nod. 

“He’ll be happy for you,” he responds, and Azu feels her chest sing. She thinks he will be too. “Now come on, breakfast is ready and the village elder is eating with us today. Mama needs us to get ready.” Emeka holds out a hand to Azu, helping her climb down, and then wraps her in a tight hug, pressing his forehead to hers. “You’ll be incredible at it, Azu. I know you will. You better promise to come visit though, while you’re off having adventures.”

Azu smiles. “I promise, Emeka. I’ll never forget about my family.”

They climb down the mountainside together and Azu takes a moment to close her eyes once they touch down on firm ground, letting Emeka walk on. She feels the breeze against her skin, feels the wind whisper to her, feels the sun warm her as she stands directly in one of its beams. Containing her cheer of joy isn’t an easy one, but she doesn’t want to draw her brother’s attention.

She’s going to become a paladin.


End file.
